


Like Sand, Whistling Through A Sieve

by I_Am_Not_A_Robot



Category: The Hypnotists - Gordan Korman
Genre: And not beta read, Canon Compliant, Gen, Gordan Korman WHY, Hypnotism, I NEED SOMEONE TO CRY WITH, I can't believe this is the first work in the fandom, I'm Sorry, Kinda, Memory Alteration, Memory Loss, Not Happy, Sad Ending, Spoilers, Whyyyy, and I'm making it SAD, fricking read it please, guys c'mon, post-book 1, read the book, the ending made me cry and so did writing this, this book may have been written in 2013 but i'm still not over that ending, why doesn't this series have a fandom??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-13
Updated: 2019-08-13
Packaged: 2020-08-20 08:21:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20224747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_Am_Not_A_Robot/pseuds/I_Am_Not_A_Robot
Summary: Tommy can't figure out what's wrong. But yeah, something's DEFINITELY wrong.





	Like Sand, Whistling Through A Sieve

**Author's Note:**

> aajlddsklasd i'm not kidding i actually made myself cry while writing this
> 
> btw: just got back from a camping trip. that's 4 days without running water, electricity, or a decent bed! in fact, the place i was camping in had the word "bear" in the name. as in, bears are so common that this remote mountain camping spot was named after it.   
honestly i didn't even want to go, lmao bears scare me  
so i wrote this as soon as i got my wifi back!! have fun reading :)

Tommy Cicirelli can't shake the feeling that something is wrong. Sure, middle school in general is just wrong, but that's how public schools are. And growing up, that's tough too, sometimes.

But this feeling isn't about what's there. This is about what _isn't_.

He can't explain it. It's just... something's gone. Something's not right. Something spent some time in his life, touched his life and changed it - there was something _there_, dang it, where is it? where did it go?!- and then slid through the gaps of his memory, like sand in a sieve.

For a couple days, people talked about the kid that left, but Tommy can't even remember the kid that well. He was on the debate team and a part of the student council and he had light hair and eyes that... what's so special about his eyes? Nothing. Nothing's special.

So why does Tommy's brain insist there's something there, where there clearly isn't anything? For heck's sake, Tommy doesn't even see color, it's not like he'd know what shade this kid's eyes were.

_All of them,_ his mind supplies, _every single shade of grey there is for a colorblind person to imagine. _But that's a stupid thought, so he ignores it.

School ends, and the yearbooks are printed and sold. Tommy always laughs a little at the "what color do you want your background to be?" question. He gets as many signatures as a semi-popular student can- _Jax was always more popular... wait, what?_\- and is happy to see there's at least a little more variety than the standard H.A.G.S. scrawled in the inside cover. He got a few more personal messages, which was nice.

But something was missing. Maybe he missed a signature?

That night, he flips through his yearbook, his eyes focusing on that one kid, that one kid he... doesn't remember that well.

Him and Jackson Opus were never that close. He barely knew the guy. It doesn't bother Tommy that he's not around anymore.

It doesn't.

It doesn't.

Should it?

Tommy looks through his past yearbooks, stares at this kid Jax some more- something's missing, something's _missing_\- and looks at the signatures. (Since when did he call him Jax?) There are lots of impersonally polite messages, but he finds one that absolutely confuses the hell out of him. Something addressed to him, ending _'Can't wait to beat you in every video game ever over the summer! Much sincerity, Jax' _with a small, silly face scribbled next to it.

Tommy barely knew the guy, he barely knew him, _barely_... and he won't miss him much, 'cause he doesn't know him... _"Anyway, you and Jackson Opus were never that close,"_ a voice whispers- it's not his own, he doesn't even recognize it! Tommy barely knew Jackson Opus. Jackson- no, Jax! It's _Jax! _

Why is it Jax?

The next day, Tommy feels a weird feeling in his 8th period- French. Near the end of the class, butterflies rise in his stomach. And an itch, an itch to look out the small window in the door, because he's been waiting for someone. Or he was, a few months ago. He was waiting for someone, sitting in French, worrying, and he looked out and-

Tommy looks at the door, and his heart lurches when he doesn't see a person standing outside. A part of him is sincerely surprised _not_ to see someone! Who was he waiting for? Wait, no, he wasn't exactly waiting. He didn't know when he'd see this mysterious person again.

Abruptly, the bell rings, and Tommy realizes he was daydreaming about things that don't even make sense. He shakes his head and continues out the door, but that weird feeling hasn't left.

Looking intently at the ground, Tommy thinks that he can almost see the outline of footprints. His own, and someone else's. Echoes of a voice, echoes of a heartbeat, they're there in his head, pounding, yelling to be recognized and paid attention to. He follows the memory-path, yeah, it's stupid, but he follows it all the way to the bathroom.

If he listens closely, it's like a conversation from ages ago is being replayed, bounced around the walls and crappy bathroom stalls.

_"I thought you were dead, Opus! I texted you, like, six hundr..."_

_"...have to talk."_

_"-not making any sense, man! What's goi..."_

_Fierce eye contact... brilliant, astonishing irises..._

_"You're trying to-?!"_

What? What was who trying to do? Waves of- of insult?!- wash through Tommy's chest. Betrayal, too. Betrayal, and worry, and fear, and offense.

_"Relax... You are becoming very calm..."_ a voice responds in his staticky memory, and Tommy only gets more confused, looking around the bathroom like it will give any answers.

"No, I'm not," Tommy whispers in response. (Thank god the bathroom is empty.)

_"...What's with you, Opus? You know you can't hyp..."_

Oh, god. God, _Tommy_ said that! He _did!_ Why can't he recall who he was talking to, or why he was so angry? And what can't the other person do?!

Something's missing! Something's fricking _missing! Someone is gone, someone is supposed to be here, someone's gone! God, he left, he left like sand in a sieve, damn it, he _**_fled_**_ and he took something with him... _

Tommy feels like there's a wall in his head, blocking the answers, and he can't stand it, so he runs from the bathroom and the ghost voices of ages past echoing in there.

At his house, after brushing his teeth and wandering off to his bedroom, Tommy gets the feeling that he should check his texts.

He pales when he sees the name in his contacts. Jax! How come he never noticed earlier, how come he didn't ever see the years of conversation?

Tommy scrolls through them, and feels vaguely that his eyes are prickling.

_His_ eyes- they could change- no, there's tears in Tommy's eyes- but they were there in _his_, too. They were there and they were hiding behind swirling grey and a calming voice...

Tommy wants to cry. Frustration, anger, pain, oh god the pain, that loss, that grief of someone who isn't dead but is still gone and unreachable, it's tearing him apart!

He still scrolls upwards, more and more, eyes reading the bubbles of text like he's starving. So many memories, so many, so goddamn many, why doesn't he remember?! _He doesn't know Jackson Opus._

His heart skips a beat when he finds a video, and he listens to the light-haired stranger's voice. It's calming.

Tommy sniffles. "Jax..." he murmurs, reading inside jokes he knows he was in on. "Jax, who _are_ you?"

This has to mean something! Thousands of texts, thousands of memories, the message in the yearbook, the voices in the bathroom, god, there was something _there!_ And it's not anymore. It hasn't been there for months.

What happened?

What _happened?!_

He... no. Tommy wipes his tears away, suddenly confused. Tommy and Jackson Opus were never that close.

He deletes the messages, the millions of conversations he had with a stranger. A voice chokes up in his mind. _"You barely knew the guy..."_

Tommy removes Jax from his contacts. No use keeping him there, since they're never going to talk again. Why did he have him there in the first place?

_"... so it doesn't bother you that he's not around anymore."_

And it doesn't.

It doesn't.

Nothing's missing.

Nothing ever went missing, right? There's no sand in any sieve. Everything's right where it should be, and nothing left, nobody's gone, everything's _right here. _

Tommy Cicirelli doesn't miss Jackson Opus, and nothing's wrong. Why should he feel like anything's wrong?

**Author's Note:**

> why do i keep writing characters sort of grieving over other characters?? first the peter and the monsters fanfic, now this...


End file.
